PRONOMINALISED HIMALAYAN LANGUAGES LIMBU - RAI
202
203 LIMBU
P.PERUMALSAMY
1. INTRODUCTION
1.1 FAMILY AFFILIATION
Grierson (1909) while classifying Tibeto Burman languages points out that a long series of dialects spoken in the central and lower Himalayas will be classed together under one group called Himalayan languages. The early experiences of Hodgson helped him to come to this conclusion. Grierson further divides the Himalayan languages into two groups namely simple or non-pronominalized and complex or pronominalized. Limbu, the language under description, is a member of eastern sub group of Himalayan languages; it is having complex pronominalizing features. It is one of the members of Tibeto Burman sub family.
1.2 LOCATION
Limbu speakers are mainly concentrated in the West district of Sikkim state. They are also found in considerable number in the states such as Assam, West Bengal etc. In West Bengal, their presence is mainly felt in Darjeeling district.
1.3 SPEAKERS STRENGTH
Language-Mother Tongue
The speakers’ strength of Limbu in respect of language / mother tongue and bilingualism/trilingualism as per 2001 Census publication is given below.
Language
LIMBU TOTAL M F RURAL M F URBAN M F INDIA 37,265 19,599 17,666 36,303 19,021 17,282 962 578 384 Sikkim 34,292 18,025 16,267 33,693 17,703 15,990 599 322 277
Mother Tongue
LIMBU TOTAL M F RURAL M F URBAN M F INDIA 28,127 14,714 13,413 27,358 14,243 13,115 769 471 298 Sikkim 25,412 13,282 12,130 24,969 13,045 11,924 443 237 206
204 1.4 BILINGUALISM
As returned in 2001 Census, out of 34,292 Limbu speakers in Sikkim 24,863 are the bilinguals in the following languages in descending order.
Sl.No Language of Total Male Female Language of Trilingualism Total Male Female Bilingualism among the Bilingualism 1 Nepali 21675 11413 10262 i.Hindi 2285 1447 838 ii.English 1166 717 449 iii.Bhotia 65 47 18 iv.Lepcha 64 35 29 v.Rai 8 2 6 vi.Sherpa 6 2 4 vii.Tamang 4 4 0 viii.Tibetan 2 1 1 ix.OTHERS@ 18 9 9
2 English 2104 1314 790 i.Hindi 948 591 357 ii.Nepali 820 513 307 iii.Bhotia 4 3 1 iv.Tibetan 3 3 0 v.OTHERS@ 6 5 1
3 Hindi 992 605 387 i.Nepali 388 240 148 ii.English 257 154 103 iii.Lepcha 3 1 2 iv.OTHERS@ 5 2 3
4 Lepcha 34 17 17 i.Nepali 30 14 16
5 Bhotia 21 16 5 i.Nepali 9 8 1 ii.Tibetan 1 0 1 iii.OTHERS@ 1 0 1
6 Sherpa 7 4 3 i.Nepali 6 3 3
7 Tamang 5 2 3 i.Nepali 5 2 3
8 Tibetan 2 0 2 0 0 0 0
9 Total of Others# 23 19 4 English 1 1 0
205
Accordingly 72.50% are bilinguals among the Limbu speakers of Sikkim.
# Under the languages of Bilingualism the clubbed Total of Others comprise of Bilingual speakers strength in relevant languages below 100. But in the state of Sikkim the languages like Nepali, Bhutia, Limbu, Lepcha, Sherpa, Tibetan, Tamang and Rai are the most important languages. So, the bilingual strength in respect of these languages, even if it is below 100 speakers, have been taken separately and not clubbed under "Total of Others"
@ Under the head Trilingualism the clubbed Others comprise of trilingual speakers strength in relevant languages below 100. But in the state of Sikkim the languages like Nepali,Bhutia,Limbu,Lepcha,Sherpa,Tibetan,Tamang and Rai are the most important languages. So, the trilingual strength in respect of these languages,even if it is below 100 speakers,have been taken separately and not clubbed under "Others"
1.5 SOCIOLINGUISTIC SETTING
The Limbus call themselves as Yakthumba, which means differently as yak herders, fort defenders, hardworking persons etc. The Limbus are called as ‘Lum’ by Lepchas. Bhutias call them as ‘Tsong’. The original homeland of Limbus was supposed to be in the Tsang province of Tibet from where they had migrated to eastern Nepal prior to their advent to Sikkim. Limbus are divided into a number of exogamous patrilineal groups, such as Nambang, Thagim, and Libang etc. These groups are totemic or territorial. Community endogamy and group exogamy are the marriage rules. Land is the main resource for a Limbu livelihood. Land is owned at individual level. Though traditionally pasturalism and animal husbandry were their occupation presently they are engaged in terrace cultivation as well. Regarding religion the Limbus follow their own traditional belief. They do not have any deity or image of the God. Rather they worship the supreme spirit called ‘Yumasam’. Along with this religious tradition they celebrate Makara Sankranti, Durga Puja, Diwali etc. of Hindu religion. In Sikkim the Limbus are mainly concentrated in the west district. Scantily they found in the south, east and north districts. The Limbus have a rich oral tradition. The folk songs are sung by both men and women. [The source of the information furnished in this section is mainly from Singh, K.S., Sikkim, Vol.XXXIX, 1993 (Calcutta) and The Scheduled Tribes, 2001 (Oxford) Under People of India Series, Anthropological Survey of India]
Limbu as a language is used in different domains of the society as mentioned below : Limbu Language in Home Domain
In the home domain, it is the main language for communication with family members. It is also used to communicate with relatives.
Limbu in intra and inter communication levels
206
In the intra communication level, it is used in between the community members outside their home domain. In the inter communication network, they interact in Nepali language with other community members. Similarly in market and other common places, they use Nepali language. In school, English is the medium of instruction. In offices and other common places Nepali is found in use since it is the superposed variety in the state of Sikkim.
Limbu Language in Education
The last king of Sikkim, Shri Palden Thondup Namgyal of Namgyal dynasty granted permission to introduce Limbu language as one of the languages to be taught in schools in 1968. But the preparation of primers was not completed till 1979. (Subba, 1999)
By the end of 1979, text books upto Fifth standard were prepared with the active involvement of Shri B.B.Subba and Shri Chandra Mangyung who were appointed as text book writers by the Sikkim Government. In the year 1980, text books up to Eighth standard were prepared.
In 1981, the language bill, granting Limbu language a status on par with Nepali, Bhutia and Lepcha languages, was passed on the Sikkim Assembly and subsequently approved by the Governor.
By 1981, Limbu was taught up to class X. In 1984, Central Board of Secondary Education granted permission to teach Limbu language up to class XI and XII.
Limbu Language in Official and Literary Use
Lot of activities have been taking place for the development of Limbu language by Government and Non-governmental organisations. It has its own orthography called Sirijangga, which is the indigenous name of Limbu script.
In All India Radio, Limbu language programmes were introduced in 1985 with the time allotment of 15 minutes. The programme was mostly folk songs. In 1994-95, the time slot was increased to 30 minutes and the programmes were folk songs, talks and news etc. The Sikkim Government is publishing a weekly newspaper called ‘Sikkim Herald’ in all the recognised languages of Sikkim. Based on this, for the benefit of Limbu speakers, the newspaper is being published in Limbu script as well along with other language scripts. A yearly magazine ‘Emeyt nasung (Luck)’ is being published by a non- governmental organization called Limbu Literary Publication Association.
Efforts of preparing dictionaries have also been noticed in this language. In 2003, Nepal’s ‘Nepal Rajkiya Praja-Pratishtan’ has brought out a trilingual dictionary (Limbu-
207 Nepali-English). The Sikkim Government has also brought out one dictionary containing 6000 words approximately entitled ‘Yakthung-Pene-Mikphula’ (Limbu-Nepali-English) in 1980.
Novels, folk songs and short stories are also written in the Limbu language with the Limbu script. Among the writers, mentioned may be made of Mr.P.S.Subba and Mr.B.B.Subba and so on.
1.6 REVIEW OF LITERATURE
Grierson (1909) in his Linguistic Survey of India report placed Limbu language in pronominalized eastern sub group of Himalayan languages based on the features commonly shared with other languages of the same group such as Dhimal, Thami, Yakha, Khambu, Bahing, Rai and Vayu. Grierson presented the skeleton grammar of Limbu language besides the history and the speakers strength. The pronominal prefixes and suffixes added with the verb have been discussed elaborately. However, the phonological and syntactical features are least discussed.
Recently scholars have tried to describe the Limbu language in the light of modern linguistic principles (George Van Driem, 1987; Chowdhury Krishna, 1967). Studies on descriptive and sociolinguistic traits of Limbu language have been reported by various scholars (George Van Driem, Boyd Michaelovsky and Jeff Webster, 1999).
208
2.PHONOLOGY
2.1 PHONEMIC INVENTORY
Limbu comprises of 28 phonemes out of which 5 are vowels and twenty-three are consonants.
2.1.1 SEGMENTAL PHONEMES
Vowels Front Back High i u Mid e o Low a
Consonants
Bilabial Alveolar Palatal Velar Glottal
vl. vd. vl. vd. vl. vd. vl. vd. vl. vd. Unaspirated p b t d c j k g Plosive Aspirated ph th ch kh Nasal m n M Trill r Fricative s z S’ h Lateral l Approximant w y
209
2.2 PHONEMIC DESCRIPTION AND DISTRIBUTION Vowels
/ i / The high front unrounded vowel i occurs in initial, medial and final positions.
Initial / imrikpa / ‘glow worm’ / igla/ ‘music’ Medial / hikke / ‘wind’ / wagikna / ‘bat’ Final / neyendi / ‘gum’ / wati / ‘jewel’ / e/ The mid high front unrounded vowel e occurs in initial, medial and final positions.
Initial / ecci / ‘eight’ / eplabe / ‘fan’ Medial / yakpek / ‘cliff’ / yema / ‘daughter’ Final / me / ‘tail’ / soMbe / ‘chest’
/ a / The low back unrounded vowel a occurs in initial, medial and final positions.
Initial / asek / ‘python’ / ambe / ‘mango’ Medial / sawan / ‘birth’ / lap / ‘wing’
210 Final / S’a / ‘son’ / twaba / ‘fore head’
/ o / The mid back rounded vowel o occurs in initial, medial and final positions.
Initial / oMegwa / ‘baby’ / ondigek / ‘lizard’ Medial / kewokh / ‘grab’ / soma / ‘itch’ Final / hukcho / ‘finger’ / nebo / ‘nose’ / u / The high back rounded vowel u occurs in initial, medial and final positions.
Initial / uphut / ‘fist’ / uhella / ‘red’ Medial / kesuppa / ‘sour’ / sumsi / ‘three’
Final /taMkhu / ‘tobacco’ / chuktu / ‘blanket’ Consonants / p / The voiceless bilabial stop p occurs in initial, medial and final positions.
Initial / pisuwa / ‘cave’ / pereMwa / ‘childhood’ Medial / lupli / ‘earthquake’
211 / nupa / ‘son in law’s father’ Final / wathup / ‘flood’ / lap / ‘wing’
/ t / The voiceless alveolar stop t occurs in initial, medial and final positions.
Initial / tok / ‘body’ / toksa / ‘beast’ Medial / wati / ‘jewel’ / loto / ‘bread’
Final / laphet / ‘leech’ / semat / ‘urine’
/ c / The voiceless palatal stop c occurs in initial, medial and final positions.
Initial / copta / ‘habit’ / cipma / ‘hatred’
Medial / nakca / ‘pen’ / asikcikpa / ‘stingy’
/ k / The voiceless velar stop k occurs in initial, medial and final positions.
Initial / kethukpa / ‘patient’ / ku / ‘honey’
Medial / ch uktu / ‘blanket’ / kekwa / ‘doll’ Final / ondigek / ‘house lizard’ / tok / ‘meal’
/ m / The bilabial nasal m occurs in initial, medial and final positions.
Initial
212 / maMsewa / ‘worship’ / meprama / ‘flute’ Medial / samyaM / ‘gold’ / napma / ‘siege’ / khma / ‘case’ Final / najam / ‘respect’ / thum / ‘district’
/ n / The alveolar nasal n occurs in initial, medial and final positions.
Initial / namji / ‘shade’ / nipma / ‘read’ / niMmi / ‘enemy’ Medial / yenam / ‘weather’ / pona / ‘garland’ / harandi / ‘turmeric’
Final / canen / ‘fast :not taking food’ / laphun / ‘new moonlight’
/ M / The velar nasal M occurs in initial, medial and final positions.
Initial / Masi / ‘six’ / Ma / ‘fish’ Medial / yeMa / ‘sand’ / niMe / ‘oil’ / maMyokna / ‘altar’ Final / yaM / ‘money’ / puM / ‘flower’
/ s / The voiceless alveolar fricative s occurs in initial and medial positions.
Initial / siMbuM / ‘trunk’ / sata / ‘butter’ / sumbok / ‘navel’ Medial / telase / ‘banana’
213 / asek / ‘python’
/ l / The alveolar lateral l occurs in initial and medial positions
Initial / la / ‘moon’ / lekwa / ‘mud’ / luM / ‘stone’ Medial / pala / ‘spear’ / tolisiM / ‘date palm’ / citlaM / ‘pillar’
/ w / The bilabial approximant w occurs in initial and medial positions. However in the final position it is noted very scantily.
Initial / wathin / ‘egg’ / wadhan / ‘stream’ / wahaM / ‘river’ Medial / senjoMwa / ‘liquor’ / taphenwaba / ‘wicked’ / towa / ‘hammer’ / owak / ‘well water’
Final / naMlow / ‘winnowing basket’
/ y / The palatal approximant y occurs in initial and medial positions
Initial / yema / ‘daughter’ / yenam / ‘weather’ / yum / ‘salt’ Medial / seyandi / ‘finger nail’ / muyomba / ‘beard’ / muyi / ‘blessing’
/ r / The alveolar trill r occurs in medial and final positions
Medial
214 / mura / ‘mouth’ / pari / ‘comb’ / chori / ‘stick’
Final / tor / ‘caste’
/ b / The voiced bilabial stop b occurs in initial, medial and final positions
Initial / bampyo / ‘brinjal’ Medial / suba / ‘rat’ / kheba / ‘tiger’ / miraba / ‘lamp’ Final / lub / ‘to bury a thing’ / kejab / ‘player’
/ d / The voiced alveolar stop d occurs in initial and medial positions
Initial / dukma / ‘pain’ / damji / ‘dust’ Medial / kumdiM / ‘punish’ / anden / ‘already’
/ j / The voiceed palatal stop j occurs in initial and medial positions.
Initial / jasyo kesoMba / ‘grocer’ / jaMhim / ‘building’
Medial / wojak / ‘chicken’ / namji / ‘shade’
/ g / The voiced velar stop g occurs in initial, medial and final positions
Initial / giMna / ‘bell’ / gopma / ‘hunt’
215 /goroMwatikma / ‘roar’ Medial / khegoba / ‘heat’ / wagoph / ‘ island’ Final / chog / ‘do’ / seg / ‘pinch’
/ ph / The aspirated voiceless bilabial stop ph occurs in initial, medial and final positions.
Initial / pheda / ‘bull’ / phu / ‘step brother’ Medial / laphet / ‘leech’ / uphut / ‘fist’ Final / wagoph / ‘island’
/ th / The aspirated voiceless alveolar stop th occurs in initial, medial and final positions.
Initial / th en / ‘ground’ / thapme / ‘spoon’ Medial / pathima / ‘owl’ / nathya / ‘nose ring’
Final / yakpith / ‘deep’ / poMbuth / ‘ass’
/ ch / The aspirated voiceless palatal stop ch occurs in initial and medial positions.
Initial / chayik / ‘tea’ / chori / ‘stick’ / chese pokwa / ‘fruit’
216 Medial
/kamcha / ‘handkerchief’ / kechinma / ‘elopement’ / kh / The aspirated voiceless velar stop kh occurs in initial , medial and final positions.
Initial / khapmi / ‘cloud’ / khappu / ‘ashes’ / khegoba / ‘heat’ Medial / pokhwa / ‘blister’ / wakhok kyama / ‘whirl wind’ / mekhim / ‘marriage’ Final / kewokh / ‘crab’
/ S’ / The voiceless palatal fricative S’ occurs in initial and medial positions.
Initial / S’a / ‘son’ / S’igip / ‘bug’
Medial / kiS’iM / ‘cotton’ / keS’iba / ‘death’
/ z / The voiced alveolar fricative z occurs in the medial position only.
/ kezaba / ‘difficult’ / keza / ‘pea’ / tazeM / ‘talk’ / azat / ‘some’ / kuza yuMhim / ‘godown’ / nazam / ‘greeting’
/ h / The voiceless glottal fricative h occurs in the initial and the medial position.
Initial /huk ch o/ ‘finger’ /ho Mriba/ ‘window’ /hamma/ ‘burn’
217 /hapma/ ‘wash’
Medial /kh on ha/ ‘these’
Phonemic Contrasts
Vowels /i/ ~ /e/
li ‘arrow’ le ‘penis’
mi ‘fire’ me ‘tail’
pima ‘give’ pema ‘vomit’
/i/ ~ /a/
ti ‘arrow’ ta ‘wheat’
siM ‘wood’ saM ‘ray’
sima ‘to die’ sama ‘to taste’
/i/ ~ /o/ tik ‘one’ tok ‘body’
/i/ ~ /u/
sima ‘to die’ suma ‘to touch’
/e/ ~ /a/
le ‘penis’ la ‘moon’
me ‘tail’ ma ‘mother’
218
lema ‘to know’ lama ‘to take’
leMma ‘slip’ laMma ‘dance’
/a/ ~ /o/
hama ‘bite’ homa ‘stab’
/a/ ~ /u/
laM ‘leg’ luM ‘stone’
pa ‘father’ pu ‘bird’
/o/ ~ /u/
soba ‘monkey’ suba ‘mouse’
Consonants /m/ ~ /M/
lam ‘path’ laM ‘leg’
nam ‘sun’ naM ‘snow’
yum ‘salt’ yuM ‘net’
/p/ ~ /ph/
pu ‘bird’ phu ‘wife’s sister’s husband’
/s/ ~ /S’/
219 sya ‘uncooked rice’ S’a ‘son’
/b/ ~ /m/
hoba ‘mangoose’ homa ‘bark’
soba ‘monkey’ soma ‘scab’
/w/ ~ /y/
kwa ‘meternal uncle’ kya ‘dog’
/k/ ~ /g/
ikma ‘tighten’ igma ‘scour’
kopma ‘trim’ gopma ‘hunt’
/p/ ~ /b/
kebma ‘push in to’ khepma ‘remove’
/k/ ~ /kh/
kepma ‘paint (face or body)’ khepma ‘remove’
2.3 MAJOR ALLOPHONIC DISTRIBUTION
Vowels The following vowels are having their allophones. [ɨ ] High central unrounded vowel occurs after bilabial nasal and fricative
[hɨ kwa:] / hikwa / ‘dew’
220 [kEsEmɨ k] / kesemik / ‘star’ [wɒhɨ t ] /wahit/ ‘rain’
/i/ > [ i ] High front unrounded vowel occurs elsewhere [la:sik] / lasik / ‘full moon night’ [sEri] / seri / ‘thunder’
[E] Mid low front unrounded vowel occurs between two consonants
[kambEk] /kambek / ‘earth’ [ghapmE] / gapme / ‘fog’ [thEn] / then / ‘ground’
/e/ > [e] Mid high front unrounded vowel occurs elsewhere [ecci] / ecci / ‘eight’ [embichchaS’ɒ] / embichchaS’a / ‘boy’
[a] Low front unrounded vowel occurs in between consonants
[kam] / kam / ‘clay’ [damjɨ ] / damji / ‘dust’
/a/ > [ɒ] Low back rounded vowel occurs after bilabials and semivowels
[wɒphElEM] / wapheleM / ‘high tide’ [kEsEmbɒ] / kesemba / ‘cold’ [kEgobɒ] / kegoba / ‘heat’
[a] low back unrounded vowel occurs elsewhere
221 [kaisOdok] / kaisodok / ‘relatives’ [apma] / apma / ‘shoot : an animal’ [aptɨ k] / aptik / ‘blame’
[O] Mid low back rounded vowel occurs after semivowel w and fricatives
[wOdhɒ n] / wodan / ‘water fall’ [wOjak] / wojak / ‘chicken’ [sOkwa ku] / sokwa ku / ‘honey bee’
/ o / > [o] Mid high back rounded vowel occurs elsewhere
[oaji] / oaji / ‘porcupine’ [poMbuth] / poMbuth / ‘ass’
[ɰ ] High back unrounded vowel occurs before and after bilabial voiceless consonants and alveolar fricatives
[kappɰ ] / kappu/ ‘ashes’ [pɨ sɰ a] / pisua / ‘cave’ [pɰ thuMwɒ] / puthuMwa / ‘foam’
/ u / > [u] High back rounded vowel occurs elsewhere
[kumaklo] / kumaklo / ‘black’ [ukma] / ukma / ‘scrape’ [hukmunEt] / hukmunet / ‘practice’ [tumba] /tumba / ‘meet’
Consonants [f] Voiceless labiodental fricative occurs before geminated laterals and in word final position
[wɒ gOf] / wagoph / ‘island’ [wɒ fEllEM] / waphelleM / ‘wave’
/ph/ > [ph] Aspirated voiceless bilabial stop occurs elsewhere
222 [phaMjaM] / phaMjaM / ‘mountain’
[M’] The palatal nasal occurs before voiced palatal plosive
[ hɨ M'ja ] / hinja / ‘child’
/n/ > [n] The alveolar nasal occurs elsewhere
[ mEnchɨ n] / menchin / ‘bride’
2.4 CLUSTERS
Both vowel and consonant clusters are realized in Limbu.
Vowel Clusters
Vowel clusters are found in the entire word initial, medial and final positions, but the medial occurrences are more in number. Among the vowel clusters, ei and ai are found to occur more than of oi, ua, ui and au.
ei eimma ‘sink’ peigma ‘dispense’ heima ‘sow’ heiksimba ‘curve’ ai ainan ‘mirror’ aina ‘glass’ seraila ‘flesh’ laijo ‘sin’ oi soit ‘picture’ choi ch okma ‘draw a picture’
ua chua ‘water’ woS’a kua ‘chicken soup’
ui, au ,oa
kuira ‘prostitute’ pauche ‘fig’ oayi ‘porcupine’
223
Consonant Clusters
Two consonant clusters are found in initial and medial positions.
Initial krum ‘middle’ kwa ‘mother’s brother’ tyat ‘saliva’ pyappa ‘grasshopper’ sya ‘uncooked rice’ tyema ‘come and get’
Medial
In the medial position, the consonant clusters are found abundantly. These are classified as-
a. c + w Consonant + Bilabial Semivowel b. c + y Consonant + Palatal Semivowel c. M + c Nasal + Consonant d. c + c Geminated Consonant e. c + c Consonant +Consonant
c + w hikwa ‘dew’ kakhwa ‘phlegm’ togwa ‘vein’ pereMwa ‘child hood’ nerwa ‘heart’
c + y kapya ‘pot’ hetya ‘saucer’ nathya ‘nose ring’ makyu ‘bear’ samyaM ‘gold’ sawanyem ‘birthday’ luMyok ‘mosquito’ kurya ‘metal cup’
M + c thaMben ‘bachelor’ laMtiMba ‘heel’ maMdukma ‘chicken pox’ phaMjaM ‘mountain’ yeMkaden ‘desert’
224
c + c (Geminated)
khappu ‘ashes’ katti ‘sword’ ecci ‘eight’ embichcha ‘boy’ mokki ‘blood’ uhella ‘red’ chulla ‘socks’ c + c (Others) p+c hepcu ‘plough’ p+m khapmli ‘cloud’ p+s hepsiMma ‘embrace’ ph+r mephra ‘flute’ t+l kitli ‘kettle’ k+p yakpek ‘cliff’ k+t yukten ‘courtyard’ k+m oMekma ‘husband’s sister’ k+n toknuma ‘pickle’ k+k krikkrikpa ‘cricket’ k+s toksa ‘beast’ k+S’ makS’eM ‘coal’ k+w hikwa ‘dew’ k+l mandaklup ‘cattle’ k+th yekthukpa ‘hunch back’ k+ch nakcha ‘fountain’ g+y togyep ‘skeleton’ m+p tampuM ‘forest’ m+b kambek ‘earth’ p+m namdapma ‘dawn’ m+j damji ‘dust’ m+n nomna tok ‘fluffed rice’ m+r imrikpa ‘glow worm’ m+s yamsi ‘body louse’ m+l umlep ‘biscuit’ n+d mendak ‘goat’ n+j hinja ‘child’ n+m kechinma ‘elopement’ n+s mensuma ‘female’
225 Three Consonant Clusters
Three consonant clusters are found in the medial position only
hombrik uwa ‘sweat’ mundro ‘ear ring’ lemswaba ‘lazy’
2.5 SYLLABLE
The words of Limbu language made up of monosyllables, disyllables , trisyllables and tetra syllables .
Monosyllabic : V, CV, CVC etc. / mi / ‘fire’ / la / ‘moon’ / u / ‘fence’ / tok / ‘meal’ /on/ ‘horse’
Disyllabic : CV-CV, CV-CVC etc. CV-CV / se -ri / ‘thunder’ CV-CVC / wa -hit / ‘rain’ / wa -phu / ‘pool’
Trisyllabic : CVC-CV-CVC, CCV-CVC-CVC etc. CVC-CV-CVC / tem-phe-tuM / ‘malaria’ CCV-CVC-CVC / chwa-kap-log / ‘water wheel’
Tetra syllabic: CVC-CVC-CV-CVC, CVC-CVCV-CVC-CVC etc. CVC-CVC-CV-CVC / taM-S’aM-ke-bokh / ‘scorpion’
Poly syllabic : CVC-CV-CV-CVC-CVC /maM-se-wa-yak-paM/ ‘worship room’
Phonotactics
1. Words beginning with vowel sounds are less in comparison to the consonants. 2. Words beginning with p, t, c, k, s, l, h, m, n, M are very common. 3. Vowels are found to be present very commonly in the word final position.
226 4. Among the consonants, voiceless phonemes are present in the word final position than the voiced ones. 5. Length and aspiration are observed in mutual association in Limbu like the following. a. Aspiration mostly observed in the initial syllable khappu ‘ashes’ khegoba ‘heat’ phaMjaM ‘mountain’ chese pok wa ‘fruit’ However, in the word - medial and word - final positions also occurrence of aspiration is found.
pichcha ‘beef’ kakhwa ‘phlegm’ kewokh ‘crab’ b. Whenever bilabial plosive or nasal phoneme precedes or follows, the preceding or following consonant generally gets aspirated. However, other than this environment also, one can find presence of aspirated phonemes.
khappu ‘ashes’ kham ‘clay’ chum ‘friend’ thumba ‘father’s elder brother’ tamphuM ‘jungle’ pathima ‘owl’
c. Whenever the lengthening is occurred in the vowel, the preceding or following consonant generally does not have the aspiration sound.
[ lu:pli ] / lupli / ‘earth quake’ [ ko:pma: ] / kopma / ‘hill’ [ wa:bak ] / wabak / ‘lake’ [ sE:ri ] / seri / ‘thunder’ However, there are some exceptions also [ wɒ:dha:n ] / wa:dhan / ‘water fall’ [ wɒ:thup ] / wathup / ‘flood’
d. Falling and rising tones are observed in the following examples. However, apart from the cited examples and few more,there is no substantial evidence to consider it as a supra segmental phoneme. [tók] ‘body’ [t`ok] ‘meal’ [ kùa] ‘soup’ [kúa] ‘mother’s brother’ [núba] ‘good’ [nùba] ‘niece’
227 e. Nasalisation of vowels is observed in some lexical items. However, it
is considered only in phonetic level.
[ limũ ] ‘climbed’ [ Myã ] ‘mother’s brother’s wife’ [ niMyãma ] ‘happiness’ f. Lengthening of vowels is observed in the study. However, it is considered only in phonetic level.
[pu:hap] ‘nest’ [ ho:ba ] ‘mongoose’ [ umse:] ‘areca nut’ [me:] ‘tail’
g. The occurrence of voiced aspirates in the initial and medial positions is rare. The voiced aspirates do not occur in the final position. In Limbu language, voiced aspirates are not phonemic.
[ghapmE thomba ] ‘fog’ [dhuMsɨ mma ] ‘kneel down’ [ wɒ dham ] ‘steam’
228
3. MORPHOPHONEMICS
1. When the plural affix me- is prefixed to the verb base to indicate plurality, the initial voiceless consonant of the verb base gets changed into voiced one. a. embichchayin keMe ‘boy falls’ embichcha S’aha megeMe ‘boys fall’ b. kon yanu pe ‘I go to field’ konha yanu mebe ‘We go to field’
2. The verb tye ‘come’ becomes a negative one, as mediyenen ‘did not come’. Here also, when part of the negative feature [me - ~ -nen] me- is added before the verb base, the voiceless consonant becomes voiced one in the process. Thus, the word initial voiceless consonant gets changed into voiced one when the prefix me- is added before the verb base.
3. With the change in number, the lateral consonant –l is interchanged with trill consonant -r a. kene nanboo lokte ‘You ran in the competition.’ You (sg ) ran b. kene nanboo kerokte ‘You (pl) ran in the competition’ you (pl.) ran
4. The auxiliary verb aM when it follows a vowel of the preceding noun does not get changed whereas the preceding word ends with a consonant then the consonant gets geminated.
kune aM yanu peklapat ‘He will be going to field’ he aux. field to go fut.con. konyinnaM yanu peklapat ‘It will be going to the field’ it aux. go fut.con. Here one should note that the inflection takes place in the following way:
kon ‘it’, konin ‘it (definite) and kon in naM ‘it be’
229
4. MORPHOLOGY
4.1 NOUN MORPHOLOGY
4.1.1 WORD FORMATION
The word formation in Limbu is mostly by inflection i.e. stem + affix. The stem may be nominal one or verbal. Examples: him ‘house’ -ha ‘plural marker’ himha ‘houses’
tye ‘come’ tama ‘to come’ tama chukka ‘may come’
Reduplication The word is also being formed by partial repetition of the syllables in some of the words in Limbu. The following words are examples :
me meduma ‘widow’ th akket th akpa ‘weaver’ sigeM geMba ‘thin’
4.1.2 NOUN
Classification of nouns
There are two types of nouns: Basic and Derived
Basic Nouns
Basic nouns are nouns, which are not derived from another noun.
makyu ‘bear’ wamat ‘hen’ pheda ‘sheep’ kheba ‘tiger’ siMpekwa ‘leaf’ puM ‘flower sorim ‘lemon’
Basic nouns are further divided into mass nouns and count nouns. Mass nouns are always singular and count nouns are nouns that can be counted as singular or plural.
230
Mass Nouns surit ‘air’ chua ‘water’ wahit ‘rain’ Count Nouns pheda ‘sheep’ siMpekwa ‘leaf’
The nouns can be further classified into human nouns and non-human nouns.
Human Nouns
Human nouns are further classified into two, viz, masculine and feminine. The masculine nouns generally ending with the suffix –pa /-ba whereas feminine nouns end with the suffix –ma
nupa ‘daughter-in-law’s father’ khuMba ‘wife’s brother’ wenchaba ‘young man’ thopa ‘father’s father lama ‘co wife’ yema ‘daughter’ nupma ‘daughter-in-law’s mother’
Non – human nouns
The non human nouns are nouns that indicate animals, birds, things and so on
poMbut ‘camel’ kya ‘dog’ pit ‘cow’ Mwa ‘cock’ pathima ‘owl’ nu ‘milk’ sya ‘uncooked rice’ li ‘bow’ thak peja ‘knife’ Young ones
The young ones of human, animal and bird are having the following lexicon to indicate the younger one
human oMegwa animal tokS’a bird puS’a
231
Derived Nouns The nouns pa ‘ father’ and ma ‘mother’ join with other words or adjectives to form a derived noun.
yechaba ‘orphan : male’ yechama ‘orphan : female’ nupa ‘son in law’s father’ nupma ‘daughter in law’s mother’
Here it may be noted that stems take suffix –ba for vowel ending nouns and –a for consonant ending masculine nouns and –ma for feminine nouns. Similarly –mana for masculine and –mensuma for feminine are used as suffixes, to form the derived nouns.
kemba mana ‘tall man’ man kemba mensuma ‘tall woman’ woman
Number
There are two types of plural formation in Limbu
a. Plural formation of personal pronoun and b. Plural formation of nouns
Personal Pronoun The three tier number systems in Limbu are singular, dual and plural. Example: Singular Ma yanu peiki ‘I go to the field’ I field to go Dual ansi necci yanu picci ‘I two go to the field’ I two field to go Plural . ani yanu pegi ‘We go to the field’ we field to go
232 Plural Formation of Nouns
The suffix –ha, a plural marker, is used for both human and non-numan nouns. Human Nouns
S’a ‘son’ S’aha ‘sons’ embichcha ‘boy’ embichchaha ‘boys’ mensuma ‘girl’ mensumaha ‘girls’
Non Human nouns
kya ‘dog’ kyaha ‘dogs’ him ‘house’ himha ‘houses’
Gender
Gender is a natural one. Gender formation are of two types: a) Different lexicons are used to denote masculine and feminine genders b)- pa /- ba, -ma suffixes are added to the adjectives or noun stems to form new noun of masculine and feminine genders.
List Gender
Masculine Feminine
pa ‘father’ ma ‘mother’
mona ‘man’ wenchama ‘woman’
S’a ‘son’ yema ‘daughter’
thaMben ‘bride groom’ menchin ‘bride’
yemba ‘husband’ met ‘wife’
Sometimes by infixing the feminine affix – m -, the feminine nouns are derived
Masculine Feminine
yechaba yechama ‘orphan’
nupa nupma ‘in-law’
In addition to above gender formation, the suffixes like - mensuma /-ma are used directly to masculine nouns to form the feminine counter parts.
233
Masculine Feminine
somwet somwetma ‘baffalo’ pichcha pichchama ‘calf’ kembamana kembamensuma ‘tall’
Mathakpa Mathakma ‘dumb’ Case Instrumental -ille /- le is used as a marker to indicate instrumental case kune tandille siMbum taMu ‘He cut the tree by axe’ he axe-by tree cut kune uwatogille uku theru ‘He washed out by flood’ he flood by to pull kune luMle lepthu ‘He was hit by a stone’ he stone by hit kutokattille tikleMsip sarike kakhu aM seru his stick with once hard beat killed
‘With one hard stroke of his club he killed’
Accusative
-yin~ -in (-yin used with bases ending in vowels; -in used with bases ending in consonant) kune peguwayin temse lokte kora peguwayin kechin he deer acc. catch ran but deer escaped
‘He ran to catch the deer but deer escaped’ kyaille miyonin aru ‘The dog barks at the cat’ dog cat acc. barks
Locative -mu~ -mo is used to indicate the locative case
234 kune kuS’aha himmu mewa ‘His sons are in the house’ his sons house in are keS’aha himmu mewa ‘Your sons are in the house’ your sons house in are a eisamen yanmu yak ‘My daughter is in the field’ my daughter field in is nisamhimmo phere ‘Come inside the school’ school in side come
Possessive The possessiveness is expressed by the use of adjunct or attributive to the following nominal base. ahimille chanin kugela yuM ‘The colour of my house is red’ my house colour red is akyaille chanin kumakhla uwa ‘The colour of my dog is black’ my dog colour black is
More Examples: kuni him ‘Their house’ their house kuni himha ‘Their houses’ houses kuyaM ‘His field’ his field kumikha ‘Her eyes’ her + eyes kuthoMa ‘Her basket’ her + basket mensumaille thoMayin ‘The basket of the women’ women`s basket Ablative
-nu is used as a marker to indicate ablative case. kune konkhuyin khopma samtaMnu yuruba he this honey hill top from brought
‘He brought this honey from the hill top’
235 Ma siMbuMhepmunu maMa uwa ‘I am far from the tree’ I tree from far am
Ma paMpheunu tandik nuMka ‘I shall come from the village tomorrow’ I village from tomorrow come shall
Vocative
yeho-, oho- affixes are used to express pain or disgust while haw-, eho- are used to express surprise and exclamations.
haw ! rama konna pere ‘O! Rama come here’ o Rama here come eho, akheno namthin o be ‘Waw! What a beautiful rain bow’ ah rainbow yeho, hapmo tuk ‘ah, pain here!’ ah here pain oho, target miss ‘O! Target missed’ target missed
Post Positions
The postpositions precede the verb in Limbu.
sappanin sapthen pusaMne ‘The book is below the table’ book table below is
sappanin sapthen samdaM ne ‘The book is on the table’ book table on is
siMbuMin khenlam mille kubesaM yuM tree that road side is ‘ The tree is on that side of road’
siMbuMin konlam mille kube saM yuM tree this road side is ‘The tree is on this side of road’
waduyin pelaM S’igaM yuM ‘The parrot is in the cage’ parrot cage in is
236
4.1.3 PRONOUN
Personal Pronouns
As discussed already, the three-tier number system is operating in the personal pronouns of Limbu. The pronouns are inflected to person and number i.e. the pronominal terminations vary according to the person and number.
Singular Ma yanu peiki ‘I go to the field’ I field to go kene yanu pige ‘You(sg.) go to the field’ you (sg.) kune yanu pek ‘He/ She goes to the field’ he/she
Dual
ansi necci yanu picci ‘I two go to the field’ I two kensi necci yanu pise ‘You two go to the field’ you two kunsi necci yanu pesi ‘He/ She two go to the field’ he / she two
Plural
ani yanu pegi ‘We go to the field’ we keni yanu pigine ‘You(pl.) go to the field’ you (pl.) kuni yanu mebei ‘They go to the field’ they
The markers identified for singular, dual and plural numbers are -e, -si and -i respectively. However, the first person singular personal pronoun Ma ‘I’ gets the allomorph an- for taking the dual suffix si and plural suffix -i.
There are three personal pronoun markers in Limbu, which are distinguished by three numbers, viz., 1. Singular 2. Dual and 3. Plural. Below are exemplified the personal pronouns.
237
First person singular
Ma ‘I’ Ma yanu peiki ‘I go to the field’ I field – to go
First person dual
ansi necci ‘I two’ ansi necci yanu picci ‘I two go to the field’ I two field to go
First person plural
ani ‘we’ ani yanu pegi ‘We go to the field’
Except first person singular Ma ‘I’ the other two, dual and plural have an- base. The dual is expressed by the use of suffix –si-, as well as the post position –necci (necci gives the meaning of numeral ‘two’)
Second person singular
kene ‘You (sg.)’ kene yanu pige ‘You( sg.) go to the field’
Second person dual
kensi ‘You two’ kensi necci yanu pise ‘You two go to the field’
Second person plural
keni ‘You (pl.)’ keni yanu pigine ‘You (pl.) go to the field’
ken- is the base form of second person pronoun. Endings of plural formation are the following: -e is for singular -si is for dual along with necci -i is for plural
Third person pronoun
238 Third person pronouns are classified into human and non-human. There is no gender distinction in human pronouns. Third person singular
kune ‘he / she’ kune yanu pek ‘He / She goes to field’
Third person dual
kunsi necci ‘ he / she two’ kunsi necci yanu pesi ‘ He / She two go to field’
Third person plural
kuni ‘they’ kuni yanu mebei ‘They go to field’
Third person non human singular
kon ‘it’ kon yanu pe ‘It goes to field’
Third person non human dual
konha necci ‘it two’ konha necci yanu pesi ‘It two go to field’
Third person non human plural
konha ‘they’ konha yanu mebe ‘They go to field’
Demonstrative Pronouns
Demonstrative pronouns are two types : proximate and remote
Singular Plural Proximate kon ‘this’ konha ‘these’ Remote khen ‘that’ khenha ‘those’ kon manayin mikmenimna uwa ‘This man is blind’ this man blind is khen mensumayin kabmou uwa ‘That girl is here’ that girl here is
239 Indefinite Pronouns halasaM ‘anybody’ and haleaM ‘nobody’ are indefinite pronouns kon yambokin halasaM chogma suktu this work anybody do can
‘Anybody can do this work’ kon yambokin haleaM chogma mesuktun this work nobody do not can
‘Nobody can do this work’
Interrogative Pronouns the ‘what’, hat ‘who’, are used as interrogative pronouns
khenin the? ‘What is that?’ that is what konin hapa? ‘Who is he?’ he is who
4.1.4 ADJECTIVE
An adjective qualifies noun and it precedes the noun in the construction.
chuppa hinjaS’a ‘The small child’ small child
makthopa kamit ‘The dark cloud’ dark cloud The plural marker is added to the noun only; not to the adjectives
kuphora on ‘The white horse’ white horse kuphora onha ‘The white horses’ horses
When demonstrative pronoun is added, it precedes the adjective
konin nuba paMpe ‘This is a beautiful village’
240 this beautiful village
konin phemba paMpe ‘This is a bad village’ bad
Classification of adjectives
Limbu adjectives can be classified as qualitative, quantitative and predicative.
Qualitative Adjectives
nuba embichcha S’a ‘The good boy’ good boy
numa mensuma S’a ‘The good girl’ good girl
nuba hinja S’a ‘The good child’ good child
yomba hinja S’a ‘The big child’ big child
sarepa siMphekwa ‘The green leaf’ green leaf
yomba him ‘The big house’ big house yamkesiMba huk ‘The dirty hand’ dirty hand
chuppa yakphaM ‘A small room’ small room
Quantitative adjectives lisi chuchuppa othinha ‘four little eggs’ four little eggs yalik yem ‘more time’ more time khegobahapmo thikille ‘One among the guards’
241 guards + among one person Predicative adjectives The adjectives are used as predicatives in some sentences. However, the adjectives follow the nouns and an inflectional affix –wa is added at the end of sentence.
khen hinjayin nathakpawa ‘That child is deaf’ that child deaf kon ketayin nuba mewa ‘The story is good’ this story/good is cheseyin sarekyapawa ‘The fruit is green’ fruit green is pokwayin yombawa ‘The basket is big’ basket big is
It is observed that adjectives are generally formed by adding the suffix –ba / -pa, -ma and –wa / -waba to nouns. However, there are some exceptions also in which there will be no affixes added at all or added with some other affixes.
khyam ‘all’ sarik ‘loud’ yak ‘more’ a jet ‘much’ eksa ‘alone’ myaksit ‘little’
The adjective forming suffixes are used according to the gender of the noun such as for the masculine gender the suffix –ba / -pa and for the feminine –ma is added. nuba embichcha S’a ‘The good boy’ good boy numa mensuma S’a ‘The good girl’ girl chuppa hinja S’a ‘The small child’ small child
4.1.5 NUMERALS
The basic cardinals from one to nine are number – specific. However, except one, the rest receive the suffix –ci (for two and eight) and –si for the others up to nine. Further, ten is expressed by the use of theboM where –boM indicates the number ten as the multiplicative unit the – being a variant of tik ‘one’, –boM is again having the further variants like –gip /-kip
242 tik ‘one’ necci ‘two’ sumsi ‘three’ lisi ‘four’ Masi ‘five’ tuksi ‘six’ nusi ‘seven’ ecci ‘eight’ paMsi ‘nine’ theboM ‘ten’
Addition
To express the higher numbers, two number terms join together. The smaller number precedes the higher number.
tik tik ‘eleven’ tik ne ‘twelve’ tik sum ‘thirteen’
It is observed that the first number has the full term whereas the following term loses the suffix –ci / -si in case of formation of higher numerals. Further, the stem for two ne- becomes ni-.
Multiplication
Ten, twenty and thirty are expressed with the allomorphs of primary numbers of one, two -three + -boM. From ‘forty’ to ‘ninety’, it is represented with the allomorphs of primary number from four to nine +-gip / -kip
theboM ‘ten’ niboM ‘twenty’ sumboM ‘thirty’ ligip ‘forty’ Magip ‘fifty’ tukgip ‘sixty’ nugip ‘seventy’ ekip ‘eighty’ paMip ‘ninety’
For one hundred, the term is kip siM
243 Ordinals
Ordinals are denoted by use of suffix –sigekpa to the primary numbers. The suffix –ci and –si of dual number are dropped for ‘two’ and ‘three’ when they express ordinals. tik sigekpa ‘first’ one ni sigekpa ‘second’ two sum sigekpa ‘third’ three
The middle and last are expressed with the suffix –wa along with the respective terms. kunumwa ‘last’ kurumwa ‘middle’ Fractional kusukwatik ‘quarter’ kuphreM ‘half’ sumsugwa ‘three fourth’ tikaM kusukwatik ‘one and a quarter’ one and quarter tikaM kuhelek ‘one and half’
4.2 VERB MORPHOLOGY
4.2.1.1 FINITE VERB The stem of the verb, which is inflected to person, number and tense, is called finite verb. The verb peikma ‘to go’ is having peik + (ma) ‘verbal stem (+ infinitive)’. It changes into the following ways when it gets inflected to person, number and tense
Tense
Simple Present
The verbal stem receives different suffixes basing on the person, number and tense. The simple present tense suffix for the first person is –i. (Due to morphophonemic change with the change of number, the verbal stem gets modified internally).
244 First Person Ma yanu peiki ‘ I go to the field’ I field to go + pre.ten. ansi necci yanu picci ‘I two go to the field’ I two go + pre.ten. ani yanu pegi ‘We go to the field’ we go + pre.ten.
Thus, peikma ‘to go’ becomes peik – i for first person singular. In the first person dual and plural the stem peik changes to picci (for first person dual) and pegi (for first person plural). The voiceless consonant in the second syllable k becomes c gemination in the dual and gets voiced as g in the plural number.
In the second person the present tense singular marker is –ge. In the dual and plural numbers the markers are –se and –ine respectively.
For the third person, human, -i is the marker for dual and plural and for the singular it is unmarked (ø). For the human plural, prefix me- is added as marker and the verb stem undergoes change from peik – to bei- with dropping of -k. In the non-human plural bei becomes be
Second Person
kene yanu pige ‘You(sg.) go to the field’ you (sg) go + pre.ten. kensi necci yanu pise ‘You two go to the field’ you two go + pre.ten. keni yanu pigine ‘You(pl.) go to the field’ you( pl) go + pre.ten.
Third Person (human)
kune yanu pek ‘He / She goes to the field’ he/she go + pre.ten. kunsi necci yanu pesi ‘He / She two go to the field’ he/she two go + pre.ten. kuni yanu mebei ‘They go to the field’ they go + pre.ten. Third Person (non human)
kon yanu pe ‘It goes to the field’ it go + pre.ten. konha necci yanu pesi ‘It two go to the field’ it two go + pre.ten. konha yanu mebe ‘They go to the field’ they go + pre.ten.
245
Simple Past
The loss of voiceless velar consonant k is observed in the verbal stem except the alternation as voiced in first person singular and second person plural. The remaining changes are as discussed in simple present tense.
Simple past
First Person Ma yanu pegaM ‘I went to the field’ I go + past.ten.
ansi necci yanu abesi ‘I two went to the field’ I two go + past.ten. ani yanu abe ‘We went to the field’ we go + past.ten. Second Person kene yanu kebe ‘You(sg.) went to the field’ you (sg) go + past kensi necci yanu kebesi ‘You two went to the field’ you two go + past.ten. keni yanu kebegi ‘You(pl.) went to the field’ you (pl) go + past.ten.
Third Person (human) kune yanu pei ‘He / she went to the field’ he/she go + past.ten. kunsi necci yanu pesi ‘He / she two went to the field’ he/she two go + past.ten. kuni yanu mebe ‘They went to the field’ they go + past.ten. Third Person (non human) kon yanu pei ‘It went to the field’ it go + past.ten. konha necci yanu pesi ‘It two went to the field’ it two go + past.ten. konha yanu mebe ‘They went to the field’ they go + past.ten. Simple Future
First Person
The vowels –ei and the mid vowel -e in the verbal stems / peik / and / abe / in first person becomes the front vowel –i for the future tense. But in second and third persons, the presence of -ei- is observed
246
Ma yanu pika ‘I shall go to the field’ I go + fut. ten. ansi necci yanu abicci ‘I two shall go to the field’ I two go + fut. ten. ani yanu abik ‘We shall go to the field’ we go + fut. ten.
Second Person
The word final vowel –e is present uniformly in all numbers
kene yanu peige ‘You(sg.) shall go to the field’ you (sg) go + fut. ten. kensi necci yanu peise ‘You(two) shall go to the field’ you two go + fut. ten. keni yanu peigamme ‘You(pl.) shall go to the field’ you (pl) go + fut. ten.
Third Person (human) kune yanu peik ‘He / she will go to the field’ he/she go + fut. ten. kunsi necci yanu picci ‘He / she two will go to the field’ he/she two go + fut. ten. kuni yanu mebek ‘They will go to the field’ they go + fut. ten.
For the non-human, only the pronouns for singular and dual vary. The remaining structure of the sentence remains unchanged.
Continuous Tense
The continuous form is expressed with –karo ~ -ciro ~ -klo ~ -gro ~ -kla affixes according to person, number and gender along with another affix following –pot ~ -bot ~ -bet ~ -boc ~ - pac.
It is observed that the pronominal affixes such as a- for first person dual and plural and ke- for second person and so on gets reduplicated before the continuous forms as well. abicciro abocci ‘I (two) are going’ abeklo abet ‘ We are going’
Present Continuous
First Person
247 Ma yanu peikaro potta ‘I am going to the field’ I go + pre.cont ansi necci yanu abicciro abocci ‘I two are going to the field’ I two go + pre.cont. ten. ani yanu abeklo abet ‘We are going to the field’ we go + pre.cont. ten.
Second Person kene yanu kebeklo kebet ‘You(sg.) are going to the field’ you (sg) go + pre.cont. ten. kensi necci yanu kebicciro kebocci ‘You two are going to the field’ you two go + pre.cont. ten. keni yanu kewigro kewocci ‘You (pl.) are going to the field’ you (pl) go + pre.cont. ten.
Third Person kune yanu peklopat ‘He / she is going to the field’ he/she go + pre.cont. ten. kunsi necci yanu picciro pacci ‘He / she two are going to the field’ he/she two go + pre.cont. ten. kuni yanu mewikla mebet ‘They are going to the field’ they go + pre.cont. ten.
Past Continuous
First Person
Ma yanu pikaMlo paccaM ‘I was going to the field’ I go + past.cont. ten. ansi necci yanu abecciro abotsesi ‘I two were going to the field’ I two go + past.cont. ten. ani yanu abero abecche ‘We were going to the field’ we go + past.cont. ten.
Second Person kene yanu kevigro kebotchi ‘You(sg.) were going to the field’ you (sg.) go + past.cont. ten. kensi necci yanu kebeciro kebotchesi ‘You two were going to the field’ you two go + past.cont. ten. keni yanu kewigro kebocchi ‘You(pl.) were going to the field’ you (pl.) go + past.cont. ten.
248 Third Person kune yanu peira pocche ‘He/she was going to the field’ he/she go + past.cont. ten. kunsi necci yanu peciro pocchesi ‘He/she two were going to the field’ he/she two go + past.cont. ten. kuni yanu mebera mebocche ‘They were going to the field’ they go + past.cont. ten.
Future Continuous
First Person
Ma yanu peikaro potta ‘I shall be going to the field’ I go + fut.cont. ten. ansi necci yanu abicchiro abotsi ‘We two shall be going to the field’ I two go + fut.cont. ten. ani yanu abigro abotsi ‘We shall be going to the field’ we go + fut.cont. ten.
Second Person kene yanu kewiglo kebot ‘You(sg.) shall be going to the field’ you (sg.) go + fut.cont. ten. kensi necci yanu kebicciro kebocchi ‘You two shall be going to the field’ you two go + fut.cont. ten. keni yanu kewigro kebotsi ‘You(pl.) shall be going to the field’ you (pl.) go + fut.cont. ten.
Third Person kune yanu pekla pat ‘He/she will be going to the field’ he/she go + fut.cont. ten. kunsi necci yanu pecciro pacci ‘He/she two will be going to the he/she two go + fut.cont. ten. field’ kuni yanu mebekla mebet ‘They will be going to the field’ they go + fut.cont. ten.
249 Perfect Tense
The perfect tense is marked with the affixes –aM ~ -saM first followed by –oye ~ -woye for present and past tenses and –nuremen for future tense with the corresponding changes for person and number.
Present Perfect
First Person
Ma yanu pikaM aM woyaM ‘I have gone to the field’ I go + pre.perf. ten. ansi necci yanu abesi aM awaesi ‘I two have gone to the field’ I two go + pre.per f. ten. ani yanu abe aM awaye ‘We have gone to the field’ we go + pre.per f. ten.
Second Person kene yanu kebe aM keoye ‘You(sg.) have gone to the field’ you (sg.) go + pre.per f. ten. kensi necci yanu kebesi aM keoyesi ‘You(two) have gone to the field’ you two go + pre.per f. ten. keni yanu kebegi aM keoyi ‘You(pl.) have gone to the field’ you(pl.) go + pre.per f. ten.
Third Person kune yanu pe aM oye ‘He/She has gone to the field’ he/she go + pre.per f. ten. kunsi necci yanu pesi aM oyesi ‘He/She two have gone to the field’ he/she two go + pre.per f. ten. kuni yanu mebe aM meboye ‘They have gone to the field’ they go + pre.perf. ten.
Past Perfect First Person aM yanu peikaM aM woyaM ‘I had gone to the field’ I go + past.perf. ten. ansi necci yanu abesi aM awayesi ‘We two had gone to the field’ I two go + past.perf. ten. ani yanu abe aM awaye ‘We had gone to the field’ we go + past. perf. ten.
250 Second Person kene yanu kebe aM kewoye ‘You(sg.) had gone to the field’ you (sg.) go + past. perf. ten. kensi necci yanu kebesi aM kewoyesi ‘You two had gone to the field’ you two go + past. perf. ten. keni yanu kebegi aM kewoyi ‘You(pl.) had gone to the field’ you (pl.) go + past. perf. ten.
Third Person kune yanu pe aM oye ‘He/She had gone to the field’ he/she go + past. perf. ten. kunsi necci yanu pesi aM oyesi ‘He/She two had gone to the field’ he/she two go + past. perf. ten. kuni yanu mebe aM meoye ‘They had gone to the field’ they go + past. perf. ten.
Future Perfect
First Person
Ma yanu pekma oyemen ‘I should have gone to the field’ I go + fut. perf. ten. ansi necci yanu abesi saM nuremen ‘We two should have gone to the I two go + fut. perf. ten. field’. ani yanu abe saM nuremen ‘We should have gone to the field’ we go + past. perf. ten.
Second Person kene yanu kebe saM nuremen ‘You(sg.) should have gone to the field’ you (sg.) go + fut. perf. ten. kensi necci yanu kebesi saM nuremen ‘You two should have gone to the you two go + fut. perf. ten. field’ keni yanu kebegi saM nuremen ‘You(pl.) should have gone to the you (pl.) go + fut.per perf. ten. field’
Third Person kune yanu pe saM nuremen ‘He/She would have gone to the field’ he/she go + fut. perf. ten. kunsi necci yanu pesi saM nuremen ‘He/She two would have gone to field’ he/she two go + fut. perf. ten.
251 kune yanu mebe saM nuremen ‘They would have gone to the field’ they go + fut. perf. ten.
Perfect Continuous
The perfect continuous tense is marked with the affixes –karo ~ -ciro ~ -klo ~ - giro ~ -kla followed by –wo ~ - woyi for present and past tenses and –saM nuremen for future tense along with the respective changes in person, number.
Present Perfect Continuous
First Person
Ma yanu pekaro uwa a ‘I have been going to the field’ I go + pre.perf.cont.ten ansi necci yanu abicciro ye awasi ‘We two have been going to the field’ I two go + pre.perf.cont.ten ani yanu abekloye awoyi ‘We have been going to the field’ we go + pre.perf.cont.ten
Second Person
kene yanu kebeklaye kawa ‘You(sg.) have been going to the field’ you(pl.) go + pre.perf.cont.ten kensi necci yanu kebicciroye kewasi ‘You two have been going to the you two go + pre.perf.cont.ten field’ keni yanu kebegiroye kewoyi ‘You(pl.) have been going to the field’ you (pl.) go + pre.perf.cont.ten
Third Person
kune yanu pekla ye uwa ‘He/She has been going to the field’ he/she go + pre.perf.cont.ten kunsi necci yanu kebicciraye kewasi ‘He/She two have been going to the he/she two go + pre.perf.cont.ten field’ kuni yanu kebegiraye kewoyi ‘They have been going to the field’ they go + pre.perf.cont.ten
Past Perfect Continuous
First Person
Ma yanu pegaMla ye oyaM ‘I had been going to the field’ I go + past perf.cont. ansi necci yanu abesiro ye awayesi ‘We two had been going to the field’ I two go + past perf.cont.
252 ani yanu abera ye awoyi ‘We had been going to the field’ we go + past perf.cont.
Second Person kene yanu kebara ye kewoye ‘You(sg)had been going to the field’ you (sg.) go + past perf.cont. kensi necci yanu kebe sira ye kewoyesi ‘You(two) had been going to the field’ you two go + past perf.cont. keni yanu kebegiraye kewoyi ‘You(pl)had been going to the field’ you (pl.) go + past perf.cont.
Third Person kune yanu peira ye oye ‘He/She had been going to the field’ he/she go + past perf.cont. kunsi necci yanu peisira ye oyesi ‘He/She two had been going to the he/she two go + past perf.cont. field’ kuni yanu meberaye mewo oye ‘They had been going to the field’ they go + past perf.cont.
Future Perfect Continuous
First Person
Ma yanu pekaM saM nuremen ‘I shall have been going to the field’ I go + fut.perf.cont. ansi necci yanu abesi saM nuremen ‘We two shall have been going to I two go + fut.perf.cont. the field’ ani yanu abe saM nuremen ‘We shall have been going to the we go + fut.perf.cont. field’
Second Person kene yanu kebe saM nuremen ‘You(sg.) shall have been going to the you (sg.) go + fut.per.cont. field’ kensi necci yanu kebesi saM nuremen ‘You(two) shall have been going to you two go + fut.perf.cont the field’ keni yanu kebegi saM nuremen ‘You(pl.) shall have been going to you (pl.) go + fut.perf.cont. the field’
Third Person kune yanu pesaM nuremen ‘He/She will have been going to he/she go + fut.perf the field’
253
kunsi necci yanu pesi saM men nuremen ‘He/She two will have been you two go + fut.per.cont. going to the field’ kuni yanu mebe saM men nuremen ‘They will have been going to they go + fut.perf.cont. the field’
Pronominalizing Feature
It is observed that the pronominal base of the first and second persons are inflected to the verbal base uniformly. The feature is prefixed with the verbal base. This type of inflection, i.e. the pronominal base embedded with the verbal base is known as pronominalized feature. It takes place in Limbu language and hence it is referred as Pronominalized group of languages.
Examples:
ansi necci yanu abesi ‘I two went to the field’ I two field go+past
keni yanu kebegi ‘You (pl.) went to the field’ You(pl) go+past
Mood
Mood expresses the speaker’s point of view about the occurrence of the event. It may be a statement, a command, a question or doubt.
Indicative
Simple declaratives sentences indicate this mood. There is no marker for this statement. kuni leMnoMbasi ‘They are merchants’ they + merchant khenin aMan ‘It is mine’ it is mine anige konlam tyeyige we this way came ‘We came by this way’
Imperative
The imperative is marked with –a and –e markers along with the verbal stems.
254 teira ‘take’ kempu utta ‘Call your brothers’ brothers call
sutlaha hirikaM saptusa ‘Write the words neatly’ words neatly write
yuMe ‘Sit down’ kamma yuMe ‘Sit on the ground’ on the ground sit
S’igaM taMke in come ‘Come in (sg.)’
ketha S’it amette ‘Tell me a story’ story one me tell
Probability Mood
The marker –chuk / -S’uk is used to express the probability mood Ma tama chukka ‘I may come’ I come may kune puyin sepma S’uktu ‘He may kill the bird’ he bird acc. kill may
Obligatory Mood
The marker –poM is used after the verb to express obligatory mood Ma tamae poM ‘I ought to come’ Come to ought
kune puyin serura poM ‘He should kill the bird’ kill should
lachik yamba kochche pegma poM one job to search go should ‘One should go to find a job’
Optative Mood
The marker –la is used to express the optative mood. It is usually added after the verb.
khenha kerakke methaM la ‘Let them all come’ them all come let
255
Desiderative Mood
-taM marker is used after the verb to express desideratative mood
Ma tama assira taM ‘I like to come’ I to come like
kune chasepakwa cama kusirataM ‘He liked to eat the fruit’ he fruit to eat liked
4.2.1.2 NON FINITE VERB
Infinitive
The suffix –ma is added to the verb to make it as an infinitive one.
Ma tama assirataM ‘ I like to come’, I to come like Here, the verb tye becomes tama to denote infinitive sense.
kune chasepakwa chama kusirataM ‘ He liked to eat the fruit’ he fruit to eat liked
Purposive infinitive is expressed through the suffix –re ~ -se after the main verb.
charamre lagi aMa kopma hettaM pegaM graze in order I hill go pt.ten
‘In order to graze, I went to the hill’
Ma temmuki Mse siligudi peka I radio to buy siliguri shall go
‘I will go to siliguri for buying a radio’
Gerund
The infinite suffix –ma is replaced with –men in the verbal form to have gerund feature.
Infinite Gerund
laMekma ‘to walk’ laMekmen ‘walking’ logma ‘to run’ logmen ‘running’ hipma ‘to beat’ hipmen ‘beating’
256
kopmao hepmo laMekmen thople meo nubaro hill in walking health is good
‘Walking in the hill is good for health’
chalik logmen kezabawa ‘Running fast is difficult’ fast running difficult is
4.2.1.3 CAUSATIVE VERB
The affix –paM / - baM and -paMkh uM will be added to the principal verb to have the causal forms.
Ma onyin lok paMkhuM ‘I have made the horse to run’ I horse acc. run make pre.perf
Ma hinjayin umlim cabaMo ‘I make the boy to eat the sweet’ I boy acc. sweet eat make
kuni onha nanpo o lokmebaM kusira mewa they horses races run make pre.cont. ‘They are making the horses to run in the races’
kune hattisi yambok kejokpen yaMasi pipaMkhura pat they some one worker 5 rupees give pre.cont. ‘She is making some one give five rupees to worker’
ansi neccire hinjayin nanbo o lok abaMsu we two boy acc. race in run make ‘We two make the boy to run in the competition’
aMa hattisi kheneo yaM pipaMkhuMla patta I someone money give make pre.cont. ‘I am making someone give you money’
4.2.1.4 NEGATIVE VERB
The negative verb is formed by prefixing me- to the actual verb and suffixing - nen to the verb.
kene yambok chokma menunen you work do not should ‘You should not do the work’
257
kune lothuyin oma menunen she bread acc. bake not should ‘She should not bake the bread’
Sometimes, instead of the suffix –nen, the suffix –n is added to the verb.
Ma mebekan ‘I am not going’ I not go Ma tandik medan ‘I shall not come tomorrow’ I tomorrow not come + fut.
It is also noticed that on the instructional type sentences, the suffix –nen loses the final consonant –n and as such only –ne is added after the verb.
kon heke mebathene ‘Do not say thus’ thus not say illek mejogene ‘Do not tell lies’ lies not tell Ma tamanule togi mebegene ‘Do not go before I come’ I come before not go
For the second person denoting verbs, the negative prefix me- is replaced with ken- affix for singular and kem- affix for plural number. Example
kene yambok kenjoknen ‘You(sg.) do not work’ you (sg.) work not do keni yambok kemjogin ‘You(pl.) do not work’ you (pl.) work not do
4.2.1.5 COMPOUND VERBS
Compound verbs are defined as the combination of two or more verbal stems to form a new verb. uMma ‘to pull’ simma ‘dip into’
The above two verbs compound together to form a new verb uMsimma ‘crawl: as a baby’. The other words in which simma combine to form new words are: puMsimma ‘gather together: assemble’ dhuMsimma ‘kneel down’
Other examples tak ‘skim : take of cream’ paMma ‘shout out’ tak paMma ‘ferment’
258
4.2.1.6 PASSIVE FORMATION
Active Voice
The object follows the noun in active voice. That is, subject comes first , then object and finally verb comes in the active sentence.
yupole yaMsamanega / yabobaga yaM pirusi Govt. poor money gives ‘The government gives money to the poor’
kune sapanin niru ‘He reads a book’ he a book reads
Passive Voice
In passive voice, the first object is followed by the noun. The second object marked with case marker which follows the noun .
yangi yupole yobobagao kubichogu money govt. poor-to given
‘Money is given to the poor by government’
Sometimes as cited in the following second example there will be no passive markers at all in the passive constructions.
sapanin kune niru ‘The book is read by him’ book acc. him read
Other examples
koreMyin Mae chaMaM uwa a the bread me by eaten is being
‘The bread is being eaten by me’
ambaka Mae chaMaM uwa a mangoes me by eaten are being
‘The mangoes are being eaten by me’
259 Negativeness in Passive Constructions
In the passive constructions, the affix men- is added before the verb to express negation. The object is followed by the subject and verb in the sentence constructions.
sayin braminS’are menyekun ‘The meat is not eaten by the Brahmins’ meat acc. Brahmins is not eaten ambaka Ma menjae uwa a ‘Mangoes are not being eaten by me’ mangoes I not eat
4.2.1.7 TRANSITIVITY
Transitive verbs are verbs in which the action denoted by the verbs pass over from the subject or doer to the object.
kune puyin mima seru he bird-acc y.day killed
‘He killed the bird yesterday’
Ma kereMin chaMa yuMa you bread obj eat pre.con
‘I am eating a bread’
Following are some of the verbs which are transitive
thuM ‘bend(a stick)’ eM ‘break a stick’ yom ‘break a pot’ phum ‘ cut a rope’ sem ‘scatter’
4.2.2 ADVERBS
The words, which qualify the verbs, are called adverbs and generally they precede the verb in the construction. noMekhaM pare ‘speak slowly’ slowly speak There are different types of adverbs namely simple, derived and so on.
Simple These are generally monomorphemic words. lok ‘part’ yen ‘day’ yem ‘time’
260
Derived
Adverbs are derived by adding some suffixes such as –ye and –miba to the noun stems. kusaM miba ‘newly’ kemsiM baye ‘smartly’ Adverbs are also classified on the basis of time, place and manner.
Time Adverbs
nambek ‘afternoon’ yunchik ‘evening’ salumba ‘midnight’ aphala saM ‘often’ achendan ‘day after tomorrow’
Direction Adverbs
namgen ‘east’ namtha ‘west’ kuruM ‘middle’ pesam ‘near’ chukwa lepsam ‘right side’ peMwa lepsam ‘left side’
Manner Adverbs
sikkumibaye ‘wisely’ kemsiMbaye ‘smartly’ kusaMmiba ‘newly’
Reduplicated Adverbs
Certain adverbs are having reduplicated words to express the greater intensity of the meaning. thik aM thik kumakhla asekkille othinha thikaMthik narusi black snake eggs-obj one by one ate ‘The black snake ate the eggs one by one’
261
4.2.3 PARTICLES
Particles belong to a wide range of un inflected words. They may be used to express negativeness or connectiveness etc. In Limbu, the following are some of the particles that are used in the expressions.
Connective Particle aM is used as a connective particle in Limbu. Example : himmu peiga aM nuke pere home go and back come ‘Go home adn come back’
Negative Particle meM - is used as a negative particle in Limbu. Example : Ma a thia M me M ku I all places no found ‘ I found it nowhere’
262
5. SYNTAX
5.1 ORDER OF WORDS IN SENTENCES
The type of sentence formation in Limbu language is as follow
Subject Object Verb S O V
Ma kune nisuM ‘I see him’ I him see
5.2 DESCRIPTION OF TYPES OF SENTENCES
Types of Phrases
The Limbu sentences consist of noun phrase and verb phrase.
Noun Phrase
A noun phrase may consist of a noun alone or followed by one or more attributes.
kune kuS’a ‘His son’ his son kuni S’aha ‘Their sons’ their sons nuba embichchaS’a ‘The good boy’ good boy numa mensumaS’a ‘The good girl’ girl
If the plural marker is added to the noun, it is added to the whole noun phrase.
yomba him ‘The large house’ large house yomba himha ‘The large houses’ houses
If a noun is modified by a quantifier, then quantifier follows the noun.
khenha kerakke them all ‘All of them’
263 When two attributes that is numerals and qualitatives are added to the nouns, the order of words will be as follow
numeral attribute + qualitative attribute + noun lisi chuchuppa othinha four little eggs ‘Four little eggs’
When the case marker or post-position is added to the noun, it will be added to the whole noun phrase.
nisam himpe saM school house near ‘Near the school’
nisam him onu school house from ‘From the house’
Attributive Noun phrase
The attriubutes always precede the nouns.
yomba sappan ‘The big book’ big book kuphora on ‘The white horse’ white horse sarepa siMphekwa ‘The green leaf’ green leaf
When the plural marker is added to the numeral attribute, it follows the noun.
yomba sappanha ‘The big books’ books kuphora on ha ‘The white horses’ horses S’arepa siMphekwaha ‘The green leaves’ leaves
When the possessive case is added to the noun, it precedes the noun. However, when the plural marker is added to them then the plural marker comes next to the noun.
ahuk ‘my hand’ keraMin ‘your foot’
264 kuraMin ‘His foot’ kuni him ‘their house’
ahukha ‘my hands’ keraMha ‘your feet’ kuraMha ‘his feet’ kuni himha ‘their houses’
Co-ordinate Noun Phrase
A co-ordinate noun phrase consists of two or more nouns or noun phrases, which are connected by co ordinated connectives.
miyo nu kya ‘A cat and a dog’ cat and dog embichcha nu mensumaha ‘A boy and girl’ boy and girl + pl.suffix
Predicate Phrase
The predicate phrase consists of a verb as a nucleus and may be followed by a noun, or an adverb or other markers such as tense, aspect and mood.
ahimmo peyage ‘go to my house’ my house go aonlatha pige ‘go to my cart’ my cart go
The adverbs precede the verb
noMekhaM pare ‘speak slowly’ slowly speak
yegaM tyaM ‘came last last came
chak pare ‘speak loudly’ loudly speak
The mood markers are added after the verb.
Ma tamachukka I come may ‘I may come’
265
kune puyin sepma S’uktu ‘He may kill the bird’ he bird kill may
Ma tama poM ‘I should come’ I come should
kune puyin serura poM ‘He should kill the bird’ he bird acc. kill should
Ma tamae poM ‘I ought to come’ I come ought
Ma tama niMsaM ‘I wish to come’ I to come wish
kene peikmae poM ‘You must go’ you go must
The negative marker is usually added before the verb. However in some cases, -ne is suffixed with the verb, in addition to the negative marking prefix.
khenin poMma suk ‘It may happen’ it may happen
khenin poMma mesuknen ‘It is impossible’ may not happen
illek mejogene ‘Do not tell lies’ lies not tell
kene yambok mejoknen ‘You (sg) will not work’ you(sg.) work not do fut
Ma niruMla yuMaM ‘ I was reading’ I read past.cont
Ma mennite yuMaM ‘I was not reading’ I not read past.cont.
266 Types of Sentences
Statement / Declarative Sentences
In statement type sentences, subject, object and verb pattern generally takes place.
kune am ma ‘She is my mother’ she my mother is
kune aeima ‘She is my daughter’’ she my daughter is
Ma eima thi kathuM ‘I have one daughter’ I daughter one have
Ma eima sumsi kathuMsiM ‘ I have three daughters’ I daughter three have
Interrogative Sentences
The interrogative words such as athi ‘where’, thye ‘what’ etc. are added after the nouns to make the interrogative sense .
keS’aha athi mewa ‘Where are your children ?’ your children where are
kene thye kejobe ‘What do you eat ?’ you what eat
kene akhen thaMbe keget ‘ How old are you ?’ you how many years old
kene theaM kebekpa ‘Why are you going?’ you why are going
Imperative Sentences
The imperative sense is marked with the affix –a which comes after the verb that is sentence ending. Sometimes –a is substituted with affix –e
chuwa azat phetta ‘Bring some water’ water some bring
kon sappanin nire e ‘Read this book’ this book read
267
himmu peiga aM nuke pere ‘Go home and come back’ home go and back come
sutlaha nirikaM saptusa ‘Write the words neatly’ words neatly write
Negative Sentences
The prefix me-, and the suffix –ne are added to the verb to express negativeness.
mipe saM mebegene ‘Do not go near the fire’ fire near not go
Sometimes men- is prefixed to the verb instead of me. braminhare S’a menjekun ‘ Brahmins do not eat meat’ Brahmins meat not eat
However, it is found that whenever mood markers are added to that verb, the negative marker is placed between the verb and mood markers
Ma yoMin koma men chuk hekkela Ma yen membek I net to find not could so I today not went ‘I could not find my net so I did not go today’
Causative Sentences
The causative marker – paM is added after the verb to express causativeness
Ma hattisi kheneo ya M pipaMkuMla patta I some one you money give cause pre. cont.ten. ‘ I am making some one to give you money’
Ma ancha mensumayin yembichao umlim chapaMkuM I my younger sister boy to sweet feed make ‘I make my sister to feed the boy with sweets’
268 5.3 DESCRIPTION OF PATTERN OF SENTENCES
All the three kinds of sentences are realised in Limbu.
Simple Sentence
A simple sentence, that is without subordinate clause consists of either object or no object in its words of components.
kyayin a ‘The dog barks’ dog barks
honin lokte ‘The horse ran’ horse run+past.ten.
anige mima tyeyige ‘We came yesterday’ we y. day came
labak siMhepmo kesesiMba aMkhebappa siMporahepmu banyan tree-in spreading branches
agwanu khumet ma agwaha yuMesi crow and wife mother+pl. lived
‘In one of the branches of banyan tree one crow and his wife crow hen lived’
Complex Sentences
The subordinate clause precedes the main clause in complex sentences.
Ma nisus ille kune kammo kheMsiMnaM nesa I saw when he ground lie down ‘He was lying on the ground when I saw him’
kon yemle aM kumakhla asekille athinha chosigaro aMa this time aslo black snake my eggs ate them if I
kon siMbuMhepmu yalikyem karakh meyuMan this tree –in more time till won’t stay
‘If the black snake eats up my eggs this time also, I refuse to live in this tree any longer’
269 Compound Sentence
A connector compounds two simple sentences into one sentence
ramare krusna phere mettu koro krusnare moyem hopte Rama Krishna come makes but krishna time no
‘Rama makes Krishna come but Krishna has no time’
Ma kune sama sardaMha tepaMkuM koro kune allo menthemana poka I him luggages take make but he now not want
‘I make him take the luggage but he does not want it now’
In the above-cited examples, two complete sentences are joined together by means of a connector koro ‘but’ to form as a single sentence.
270 BIBLIOGRAPHY & REFERENCES
Acharya, K.P. 1982 Lotha Grammar, Mysore: Central Institute of Indian Languages
Austin, H. 1982 Research on Tibeto-Burman Languages (Trends in Linguistics: State of Arts), Berlin: Mouton Publishers Barnard,Comrie 1987 The World’s Major Languages, New York : Oxford (ed) University press 799 – 810 Benedict, Paul K. 1972 Sino – Tibetan : A Conspectus J.A. Matisoff ( Ed.) Cambridge : The University Press Bradley, David 1997 Tibeto – Burman languages and classification I .D.Bradley ( Ed ) Papers in South East Asian Linguistics : Tibeto – Burman languages of the Himalayas ( no.14, pp – 71) Canbera : Pacific Linguistics Campbell, G. 1874 Specimen of Languages of India including those of the aboriginal tribes of West Bengal, the central provinces and eastern frontier , Calcutta: Bengal Secretariate Press Census of India 2001 Population by Language/Mother Tongue, (Table C- 7), New Delhi: Office of the Registrar General, India Census of India 2001 Population by Bilingualism (Table C-8), New Delhi: Office of the Registrar General, India Chowdhury, K. 1967 “Note on Investigations on Limbu Language” in B.Roy’s District Census Hand Book (Darjeeling) Census of India , 1961, New Delhi : Registrar General , India Drien George Van 1987 A Grammar of Limbu, Berlin : Mouton de Gruyter
Grierson, G. A. 1909 Linguistic Survey of India Vol. III Part I, Tibeto- Burman Family Himalayan Dialects , North Assam Groups, Delhi: Motilal Banasirdas(Reprint)
Shafer, R. 1938 Sino Tibetica , Berekely: University of California Shafer, R. 1966 Introduction to Sino Tibetan , Wiesbadan: Otto Harrassowitz Singh, K.S. 1993 Sikkim, (People of India Volume XXXIX) Anthropological Survey of India, Calcutta and Sea Gull book,Calcutta . Singh, K.S. 2001 The Scheduled Tribes, (People of India, National Series, Volume III) Anthropological Survey of India And Oxford India Paperback, Delhi Subba, J.R. 1999 The Limboos of Eastern Himalayas with Special Reference to Sikkim, Gangtok: Sikkim Yakthung Mundhum Saplopa Y.P. Yadava and Topics in Nepalese Linguistics, Kathmandu: Royal W.W. Glover (eds.) 1999 Nepal Academy
271
LIMBU
TEXT akherik agwa ma ille kumakhla asekin sEru how crow hen black snake killed
“How the crow hen killed the black snake”
1. labak siMhepmo kese siMba aM banyan tree in spreading
khebappa siMpora hepmu ag wanu branches tree in crow and khumet ma agwaha yuMesi. hap hepmu wife mother birds lived nest in lisi chuchuppa othinha menase four little eggs were there athinha sepmepmo pamahare sarike which care parents too nurik theptesu khen siMlaM hepmuba care guarded that tree trunk in hayaM hepmo khumakla aosek S’it hollow in black snake one yuMero oye athinin agwahare sarike lived which crows greatly kiresu. thiyonthok ma agwaille fear every day crow hen khuthinha thindu hekkelle osekin eggs laid so that snake haphepmu uMsiM thaMe aM naru nest in crept came and swallowed tesusi.
272 them
“Among the spreading branches of a banyan tree lived a crow and his wife, the crow-hen. In the nest were four little eggs, which the parents guarded with great care. In a hollow of that tree-trunk lived a black snake whom the crows feared greatly. Every time the crow-hen laid her eggs the snake crawled up to the nest and ate them up.”
2. “ kon yemle aM kumakhla asekille this time also black snake
athinha chosigaro aMa kon siMbuM hepmu my egg ate them if I this tree in
yalikyem karakh meyuMan. ansi happin more time till not stay we two nest
weteno chogma poM” larik ma puille another place make like this crow-hen
kuyembain mettu. crow told
“If the black snake eats up my eggs this time also, I refuse to live in this tree any longer. We must build our nest somewhere else”, said the mother bird to her husband.”
3. ansi kopmo yalik yem karakh we here more time till
ayuMessi aMa ahimmin lepma aM stayed my house to foresake
weten yuMse pegma mesukan larik another place to stay to go I can’t that
agwain pat kunsi tazeMu yuMa sille crow said they to talk stayed
hisiM ikla sik kunsi posaM khemsu. hissing sound they below hear- they
ikla in thenlan oye khen khunsi sound what was that they
kusiMni tesu. hapsigaM kuphamene knew them nest in helpless
273 kunsi tinha sepmare tomsino they eggs to guard try
yuMesi kumakhla asekin thaMthaM lived black snake up
yam mo hapille pesaM uM sin again nest hear crept
hekke aM yomba hishepmu puha there after big hissing in birds
thok sapma tomsin choge athinha to attack try which
yoMma khepmaye pereaM pesi kumakhla fear with flew away black
asek kille othinha thik aM thik narusi . snake eggs one by one ate
“ We have lived here a long time. I can’t bear to desert my home and go to live elsewhere”, said the crow. While they were talking, they heard a hissing sound just below them. They knew what the sound meant. They sat helplessly in the nest trying to protect their eggs. The black snake crept higher and closer to the nest. Then with a loud hiss he tried to strike at the birds who flew away in terror. One by one, the black snake swallowed the eggs.”
4. pamaha miMwa pok`esi aM parents send they become and
haphepmu nukesi athinhare teaM nest in back they which
menen enphaM nurike kusiM nitesu aM nothing would there well knew and
oye. agwaille patu “aMa kon niMkhumba it crow told I this murderous
asekin petlamare meu / lagi lambe S’it snake destroy in order of one khopma poM. find
274
The parents came back sadly to their nest, knowing well that they would find it empty. The crow said, “I must find a way to destroy this murderous snake.”
5. “khene akherikaM kunenu chuMma you how he with to fight
kesuk ? sikmEtin sarike kejaba uwa you can sting too much dangerous is
larik kumethin kuniMsaM pugero pat”. like this his wife despair told
“How can you ever fight him? His sting is so deadly”, said his wife in despair.
6. khene keyOMma megerene minjime you worry don’t dear
aMa chumS’it kothoM a thin in I friend have which
niMiba aseha petlamame pmo poisonous snake in destroying
iswaba uwa larik agwain pat cunning is like this crow told
hek kiyaM kune we siMbuM hepmo thereafter he another tree in
perebe athille kuphosaM kumim flew where under his dear
kunjuM kidiruppen yuMere oye . friend jackal living was “Don’t you worry, my dear, I’ve got a friend who is cunning enough to destroy the most poisonous of snakes, “said the crow, and off he flew to another tree under which lived his dear friend, the jackal.”
7. asekille aphalasaM othinha snake always eggs
chosi tesusi keroben kidiruppele ate them jackal
275
khepsunnu kune patu aMjuMme heard he told my friend
athinha luM ma mendukmana yem mo who cruel and
kek kimba mewa khen hare kunum o greedy these they people end at
aphalasaM taterat medumu always inauspicious they will find
megisene aMa khene petlamare don’t fear I he to destroy
yambein yituM suruM aM uwa. Way thought is
“When the jackal heard how the snake always ate up the eggs, he said, “My friend, those who are cruel and greedy always meet with a bad end. Have no fear, I’ve already thought of a plan to destroy him.”
8. haw, aMain ametta khenin oh, I also me tell that
thebe larik agwain pat what like that crow said
he kkeaM asekin petla mare there after snake to destroy
meo techogma poM khenin in order to what to do that
kidrupelle oyire mekhepsu phaM jackal others heard over
kiro noMekaM kunjummin mettu fear whisper friend told agwa in pepekaM lamberapanin crow flew way / plan
kumEthin chaktu ‘ konin ajek wife to expose this bit
276
kezaba u wa larik agwain pat difficult is like this crow said
ani sarike sapsimma poM. We too much to be careful
“Oh, do tell me what it is, “ said the crow then the jackal, fearing he might be overheard, whispered to his friend what he should do to destroy the snake. The crow flew back to his wife and told her about the plan. “It is rather risky”, said the crow. “We’ll have to be very careful.”
9. aMa athinha Sepmere lagi I eggs to protect order to
meo tesaM chopma suktuM whatever to do can
larik mapuin yam poM bae pat. like this crow hen bravely said
“I’ll do anything to save my eggs”, said the mother bird bravely.
10. hekkeaM khunsi lajeba haMille there after they countrie’s king’s
haMyukna lepsaM perepesi kunsi palace towards flew they
yuMesiba siMbuM hepmonu huMyukna in stayed where tree from palace
khempa mema khen kunsi haMyuknaba too far not they palace
puMgik S’igaMba yom othako ketchi garden inside big pond to reach
athinhe haMsama mensumaha uwa where in royal ladies taking
merum sinla meyakaba nisu bath were saw
khenhare khunsi samyaM ponaha those they gold chains
277 moti ichihanu u wei kawha othakille pearl necklaces other jewellery pond kukheM bepmu menasusiaM nesse edge at kept were mapu in mo perepe i aM samyaM mother bird down flew and gold pona in kumrao kasu aM kune chain beak picked and she yuMeba siMbuM lapsaM noMe kaM staying tree towards gradually pema ekta haMyukna kegobahare fly start palace guards puin samyaM ponanu peraraoyeba bird gold chain with flying menisulla khunsi thok katha saw they clubs merotuaM puin menatu kuni took and bird closed they puille samyaM ponain siMbuM bird gold chain tree
hepmoba hayoM S’igaM moktandu in hollow inside dropped theguba menisu khegoba hapmo saw guards among thik ille pona in lobmare meo / lagi one person chain to take out in order thaM siM buMin liMu ponain lobmare up tree climbed chain take out meo kuhoMhepmu kuhukin thegunnu in order to hole in hand put
278
kimmo e kuma khla asekin tan immediately black snake up
iksinla taMeba nisu kuto kattille curled same saw his stick
tikleMsip sarike kakhu aM seru once hardly beat and killed
hekke aM kheninne kumakhla there after that only black
ase kille kunumuwa poke. snake end
“So off they flew towards the palace of the king of the country. The palace was not far from the tree in which they lived. They approached a big pond in the palace garden where they saw the royal ladies having a bath. They had laid their golden chains, pearl necklaces and other jewellery on the edge of the pond. The mother bird flew down, picked up a gold chain in her beak and started flying slowly towards the tree in which she lived. When the palace guards saw the bird flying off with the gold chain, they took up their clubs and chased the bird. They saw the bird drop the chain into the hollow of a tree. One of the guards climbed up the tree to get the chain. As he put his hand inside the hole to get the chain, he saw a black snake curled up there. With one hard stroke of his club he killed it and that was the end of the black snake.”
11. khenleye gaM panu ma agwaha khen there after father and mother crow that
siMbuM hepmu niMsapmae yuMesi yemmu tree in happily stayed again
chuchuppa oMegwa awaha aM kottesu. little baby crows also had
“The crow and the crow-hen lived in that tree happily afterwards and had many little baby crows.”
------X------
279